Head movement drills

One of the most common criticisms I hear about Kudo is that the use of the headgear makes us feel protected and so we have crappy punch defense and tend to get over reckless. I can certainly understand this criticism and it is easy to fall into bad habits of allowing yourself to take hits because it doesn’t hurt as much with the headgear on . But in my opinion most high-level Kudoka have very good punch defense . But it is something that takes time to develop, and if done poorly in a sport where knees and kicks to the head are involved, mistakes can get you into trouble.  However, we don’t have large gloves to hide behind and with the headgear on, our head is a bigger target. Plus small ungloved fists can find holes in your defense easier making punch defense that much more difficult . So having solid punch defense combining blocks, parries, head movement, and footwork is even more important in Kudo.  Here are a few head movement drills from a one two, followed by some sparring, with a focus on punch defense. I have an injured foot in this clip and couldn’t kick, so I used it as an opportunity to work on my hands.